COMPSCI 111 / 111G
Mastering Cyberspace:
An introduction to practical computing
Social Issues and Legal issues;
filesharing
Social concerns
Technology changes our world rapidly
– Laws, traditions, social expectations change slowly
Problems
– Unemployment
– Crime
– Privacy
– Reliability. The amount of people contributing to the
information on the Web is only a few percent. The rest only
comsumes information
– Alienation
– Exclusion of people without access to Internet
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Legal Issues
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Potential concerns for one’s personal life
• Spend too much time online
– E.g unhealthy lifestyle, no exercise
• Lack of real human contact
• Trying to be everywhere at the same time
• Losing sense of reality
• Being connected through the Internet creates constant
distraction. One Internet & mobile free day per week?
• Information overload
• Web content can be addictive
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Anonymity
Questions
– Is the Internet anonymous?
– Should it be anonymous?
– What are the implications of anonymity?
Advantages
– Allows discussion of sensitive issues
– sexual abuse, mental illness, substance abuse
Disadvantages
– Allows people to be irresponsible
– False accusations, personal abuse
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Social Imperialism
The Internet is an international resource
– Dominant language is English
– Dominant culture is American
– China is catching up in both respects. Weibo etc.
Smaller cultures
– Diluted?
– Empowered?
Who *really* controls the Internet?
– Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
(ICANN)
– Top-level domain such as
.com
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"Dangerous" material
Material that could be misused?
– How to guide for stalkers, rapists, murderers
– How to pick locks, make guns, chemical warfare
– Make bombs out of household cleaners
– Make nuclear weapons
Other "dangerous" material
– Religious views
– Political views (Capitalism, Democracy, Socialism)
– Racial views
– Invasion of privacy (abortion)
– Means to organise activists
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Peer to Peer networks
BitTorrent Protocol due to Bram Cohen, 2001
– Allows ``swarming downloads’’
Peer to Peer networks based on BitTorrent; 50% of all Internet traffic
– Form a direct connection to other computers
– Allows access to files on those computers
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Copyright
Copyright Act (1994)
– May not legally make copies
– Backup permitted
– May not change format
Copyright (New Technologies) Amendment Act 2008 No 27
– Allows format shifting (1 copy of music per player)
– Allows transient copying
– Allows time-shifting (must delete after watching)
– Currently legal
– Ongoing discussion about digital rights and copyright issues
Solutions: streaming, password protected files…
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/
http://www.parliament.nz
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Access across borders
Medicine
– Illegal Pharmaceuticals
Films, Videos, and Publications Act (1993)
– New Zealand censorship laws
– Office of Film and Literature Classification
– An objectionable publication is defined by section 3 of the
Act as one that deals with matters such as sex, horror, crime,
cruelty or violence in a way that is likely to be harmful to the
public good.
Two ways that censorship laws are broken
– Viewing illegal material
– Legal material being viewed illegally (by young people)
http://www.censorship.govt.nz/
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Games
• 2008 study of Computer Game use in Hamilton, NZ
– Seven out of 10 children said they had played restricted video
games (classified above their age), with 16% self‐reporting they
‘always’ played such games and more than half saying they did
‘sometimes’.
– There was a high recognition rate of the censor’s red
age‐related R18 label (and the green G) among the children,
with the exception of the youngest aged five and six years.
– However, one five year wrote that R18 referred to ‘a game’
while G was ‘for movies and videos’, and another wrote ‘I can
play it’ to describe what R18 meant. An 8‐year‐old boy wrote
that R18 meant ‘an adult has to watch’, while another aged six
said R18 was ‘for boys’ and G ‘for girls. Other boys’ comments
included ‘dumb’ for the G rating, and ‘cool’ for R18.
http://www.parentline.org.nz/files/parentline-R18-survey-report.pdf
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Sexual Content on the Web
WWW - Legal material
– Traditional Magazines (Playboy, Penthouse etc.)
– Peep shows, Live Webcams, Streaming video
– Amateurs
WWW - Illegal material
– Usually hidden
– Illegal in one country, legal in another
– Sometimes archived by search engines
Email, Chat, Forums
Social Networking
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Protecting Children
Internet as Education Medium
– Internet available in schools
– Children, Parents, Teachers want access
Some material unsuitable for children
– X-Rated material
– Coarse language
– Anti-social information
Online attention
– 57% of children (12-17) have created blogs or posted photos
(U.S.)
– 20% of children (10-17) receive unwanted sexual solicitation
(U.S. DOJ)
• Estimated 1 in 4 of these are from pedophiles
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Methods available to parents
Supervise your children
– Situate computer in public place (lounge)
– Check the logs of sites visited
– Discuss Internet content with your children
Blocking software
– Stops access to sites based on the IP address
– White list / Black list
Filtering software
– Stops access to sites based on the content
– Keyword / phrases / image analysis
– PC, ISP, Third-party
http://www.aba.gov.au/newspubs/documents/filtereffectiveness.pdf
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References - Social Issues
Internet Safety Group (NZ)
– http://www.netsafe.org.nz/
Report on Filtering
– http://www.aba.gov.au/newspubs/documents/filtereffectivene
ss.pdf
Ministry of Economic Development
– http://www.med.govt.nz
– Copyright Law
– Broadband
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Filesharing
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Cloud storage
 Idea: The primary storage of important files is in the ``cloud’’
(i.e. someplace that is accessible through the Internet).
 Cloud-based storage services: Dropbox, MS SkyDrive, Google
Drive, SugarSync, … easy to use.
– E.g. Dropbox and SugarSync clients can be installed on your
device.
– Each time the device is online and the service running, the local
version of the file gets ``synced’’ (synchronized)
– you can choose which files/ folders on your device to sync
 GIT, SVN (subversion) are more powerful, but also more technical
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Why would you want to do this?
• Files are accessible from any connected device
• Automatic backup. If one device gets lost or breaks, the primary
version of the file still exists
• Usually the service is free for limited storage. (SugarSync isn’t)
– Dropbox initially gives you 2 GB. This can grow.
– Google Drive gives you 15 GB
• Good for collaboration. Files are not finished (like pics) but in
progress (like an essay written jointly)
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Filesharing for collaboration
• The same file is synced to devices of several users
• Need a version control, for instance to handle conflicted
versions of the same file,
• Need to keep history to return to previous versions
– Free dropbox version: 30 days only
• FS is useful if several people work on the same project
– joint paper in science
– team, say in advertising
• FS can replace email attachments.
– No more questions what the current
version is.
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Potential problems with filesharing
• Confidentiality- can a third party see it?
• Sync conflicts when people work on a file at the same time, or
forget to save.
• Only the secondary memory (hard drive) gets synced!
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